Thread: Anandtech News

When Apple cancelled its AirPower wireless charging mat earlier this year, many users of the company’s latest devices got upset, yet spawned a number of third-party options that offer similar functionality. One of such products is the AirUnleashed wireless charging mat that looks like Apple’s AirPower and can charge up to three Qi devices simultaneously. There is a catch, of course.

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Valve this week started to take pre-orders on its next-generation Index VR headset that was developed entirely in-house. The product significantly improves all the capabilities of the HTC Vive (the first Steam VR headset) when it comes to screen quality, controllers, ergonomics, and tracking (according to the developer).



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One of HP’s key announcements this spring was its revamped security initiative for PCs that includes hardware, software, and deep learning-based approaches. The software and DL parts of the things were discussed earlier this month, but the hardware-based Endpoint Security Controller remained more or less a mystery. This is why we asked HP to talk about it in more detail.
When it was announced, the company said that the HP Endpoint Security Controller is indeed a separate piece of silicon that sits inside HP’s PCs and performs certain security-based tasks. The ESC features a general-purpose processor core, HP’s custom hardware IP blocks, and embedded software. What is interesting is that HP has been installing the controller into its laptops since the EliteBook 800 G1 series launched in 2013, but has been very secretive about it until recently.
Initially, HP used the Endpoint Security Controller only for its Sure Start technology that can 'heal'/recover the system BIOS. Fast forward to 2019, and the controller has gained capabilities. HP now uses it to protect Intel’s Management Engine, and to enable its Sure Run and Sure Recover capabilities.

HP stresses that it is focused to continue to explore features of its ESC to make its HP Elite as well as select HP Pro business computers and select ZBook workstations the most secure mobile PCs on the market. Without disclosing any future plans, HP essentially implies that in the future it can use the Endpoint Security Controller for other security-related features.
HP’s ESC with all the bells and whistles is currently used in the company's sixth-generation EliteBook 800-series as well as HP ZBook 14u and 15u workstations. Eventually, capabilities of the Endpoint Security Controller will migrate to other systems too.
One of the key things about the ESC disclosure is that it shows PC makers are prepared to implement their own hardware-based methods to improve security of their premium PCs aimed at professionals. One would hope that this is a good news, assuming the controllers are sufficiently audited and not just obfuscated, but it will be interesting to see when and if HP incorporates its Endpoint Security Controller into premium consumer and mainstream consumer PCs.
Related Reading

• HP’s Security Push: Sure Sense & Endpoint Security Controller
• New HP ZBook 14u & ZBook 15u Portable Workstations
• HP’s Cascade Lake Z6 & Z8 Xeon Scalable Workstations with Up to 6 TB Optane
• HP Launches ProBook 400 G6 Series: Thinner & Sleeker Workhorses

Source: HP

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According to a new financial presentation from Nidec, a Japanese motor manufacturer who is responsible for around 85% of all HDD spindle motors, the company believes that shipments of hard drives for PCs will drop significantly this year. Citing numerous ongoing trends, the motor maker is preparing for HDD motor sales to drop by around 50% year-over-year for 2019. Meanwhile the company also expects sales of other types of HDDs to slow, but not as drastically. In fact, unit shipments of hard drives for datacenters are projected to increase a bit.

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Lenovo is gearing up to launch a new series of notebooks aimed at mainstream users. The new ThinkBook laptops were recently showcased at a trade show in China and are currently listed by at least two European retailers. Meanwhile, based on model numbers, it looks like that when they launch in the coming weeks, the new ThinkBooks will succeed certain IdeaPad models within Lenovo's laptop product stack.



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Intel this week initiated an end-of-life plan for its Movidius Neural Compute Stick, which is based on the Myriad 2 VPU. The product will be available for another year and Intel will continue to provide technical support for the device for another two years. For developers currently working on products powered by the NCS, Intel suggests developers move over to the more advanced Myriad X-based Neural Compute Stick 2.

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Continuing the march of progress in the HDD industry, Seagate has revealed that they have started shipping their 16 TB PMR hard drives. In a quarterly earnings call last week, the company reported that the drives have been shipping since late March, with current shipments coming ahead of high volume production of the drives. Seagate in turn expects to kick off mass production in the second half of 2019, and by Q2 2020 the new 16 TB drives will be its highest revenue SKU. What is particularly noteworthy here, besides the capacity of course, is that these drives do not use next-generation heat assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) technology. Instead, they're based around more contemporary perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR), which is being boosted by two-dimensional magnetic recording (TDMR).

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Small form-factor (SFF) machines have predominantly used 5W - 45W TDP processors. The introduction of the mini-STX form-factor standardized a compact form factor for systems with processors having a TDP up to 65W. However, the mini-STX form-factor along with the associated cooling system is still too bulky for certain use-cases. Shuttle's XPC slim line aims to serve the market segment requiring standard desktop processors in a compact form factor. These computers are a fit for a variety of business and commercial use-cases. Today's review takes a look at the Shuttle XPC slim DH370, a barebones PC platform that can accommodate the Intel 8th Gen. desktop processors.


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Marvell on Monday announced that it had reached an agreement to buy the networking specialist firm Aquantia for $452 million. The acquisition will allow Marvell to significantly augment their current networking capabilities, with the company intending to use Aquantia's technology in future PC, enterprise, and especially in-vehicle applications.

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Lenovo on Tuesday introduced upgraded versions of its ThinkStation P720 and ThinkStation P920 workstations. The new machines are based on Intel’s second-generation Xeon Scalable processors codenamed Cascade Lake and add support for NVIDIA’s latest Quadro RTX 8000 graphics card.
Lenovo’s new ThinkStation P720 and ThinkStation P920 workstations are based on up to two Intel Xeon Scalable processors featuring up to 28 cores per socket and running at up to 4.4 GHz. The CPUs are paired with up to 384 GB or 2 TB of DDR4-2933 memory (P720 or P920 respectively) as well as multiple NVIDIA Quadro RTX 8000 or Quadro GV100 graphics cards. As for storage capabilities, we are talking about machines supporting several NVMe/PCIe SSDs (either in M.2 form-factor or on a special PCIe 3.0 x16 Quad M.2 adapter) as well as up to 60 TB of HDD capacity.

The manufacturer positions its new workstations for a wide variety of workloads, but considering capabilities of Intel’s second-generation Xeon Scalable processors (VNNI instructions) as well as NVIDIA’s latest Quadro RTX 8000 graphics cards, Lenovo puts a special emphasis on AI-related workloads that benefit from the new hardware. Obviously, the new CPU and GPU will also improve performance in content creation and other applications.

Lenovo says that because of its advanced internal architecture and airflow management the ThinkStation P720/P920 machines running two CPUs and two or three GPUs will be able to work stably for prolonged periods of time, something all users expect from workstations.
The new ThinkStation P720 and ThinkStation P920 workstations will be available in May in various configurations, although interestingly Optane versions are not listed. We might see Optane variants pop up in due course.

Lenovo ThinkStation P720 and P920: General Specifications
	ThinkStation P720		ThinkStation P920
CPU	Dual Intel Xeon Scalable s (up 28 cores, up to 4.4 GHz per CPU)
Chipset	Intel C621
RAM	Up to 384 GB DDR4-2933 with ECC		Up to 2 TB DDR4-2933 with ECC
GPU	Up to NVIDIA Quadro RTX 8000 or dual GV1002		Up to two NVIDIA Quadro RTX 8000 or three GV100
Storage	Max M.2 = 2 (2 TB) Max 3.5” SATA = 6 (60 TB) Max 2.5” SATA/SAS = 10 (20 TB) RAID: 0, 1, 5, 6, 10
Expansion	3 x PCIe x16 1 x PCIe x8 1 x PCIe x4 1 x PCI		5 x PCIe x16 3 x PCIe x4
Networking	2x Gigabit Ethernet Intel Wireless N 7260 AC module featuring 802.11 ac, 2 x 2, 2.4 GHz/5GHz + Bluetooth 4.0
I/O	Front: (4) USB 3.1 Gen 1 (Type A) (1) Microphone (1) Headphone (1) Intel Thunderbolt 3 Rear: (4) USB 3.1 Gen 2 (2) USB 2.0 (1) Rear Thunderbolt Adapter (1) Serial (1) Parallel (2) PS/2 (2) Ethernet (1) Audio Line-In (1) Audio Line-Out (1) Microphone-In (1) eSATA (1) Firewire		(4) USB 3.1 Gen 1 (Type A) (1) Microphone (1) Headphone (1) Intel® Thunderbolt 3 Rear: (4) USB 3.1 Gen 2 (2) USB 2.0 (1) Rear Thunderbolt Adapter (1) Serial (1) Parallel (2) PS/2 (2) Ethernet (1) Audio Line-In (1) Audio Line-Out (1) Microphone-In (1) eSATA (1) Firewire
Dimensions	(mm) : 175 x 485 x 446 (inches): 6.9” x 19.1” x 17.6”		(mm) : 200 x 620 x 446 (inches): 7.9” x 24.4” x 17.6”
Various	Windows 10 Pro for Workstations Ubuntu Linux (pre-load) Redhat Linux (certified)		Windows 10 Pro for Workstations Ubuntu Linux (pre-load) Redhat Linux (certified)

Related Reading:

• Lenovo’s New Cascade Lake ThinkSystem Servers: Up to 8 Sockets with Optane
• Lenovo Unveils ThinkStation P520 & P920 ‘AI Workstations’: Xeon Plus Quadro RTX 6000
• Lenovo at CES 2019: 43.4-Inch Curved Monitors for Gaming and Work

Source: Lenovo

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